Baby Steps
by Glow
Summary: Sure, Haley knew who Nathan Scott was. Who didn't? Knowing and liking, however, are not the same thing. [Complete]
1. Knowing

Rating: PG  
Spoilers: Everything that's aired in the U.S so far, to be safe.  
Pairing: pre-Nathan/Haley  
Disclaimer: Still not mine.  
Notes: Today is a good day for OTH fans. We got the full season pick up and a ff.net section. Tomorrow we take over the world! Got this plot bunny while studying for my Anthropology exam. I'm so blaming OTH if I do badly. (But I didn't so it's all good). I wrote it as a one-parter. But it ended up being 3000+ words so I'm splitting it into 2 for easier digestion. Reviews appreciated.   


Part One:  
  
Even before the chain of events that had led to Lucas making Tree Hill High's varsity lineup, Haley hadn't thought highly of Nathan Scott. Sure, she knew of him. He was one of the most popular guys around being a good athlete, rich and good looking. It was hard not to notice him. He was rarely seen without an entourage of jocks, cheerleaders and wannabes, the size of which rivaled J. Lo's.   
  
She'd never really spoken to him. Well, she had. They'd grown up together. Been in the same classes, etc. Tree Hill was a small town, the high school boasting a population of a mere 400. Most of the students were like Haley. They'd grown up in Tree Hill. As had their parents. And their grandparents. The town attracted very few new citizens. The few that it did were usually older couples, attracted by the quaintness and quiet, who were looking for a place to retire. So while she and Nathan had, on occasion, spoken, they'd never been friends. She knew next to nothing about him (and what she did know was based on what she couldn't help but learn from the high school's active rumor mill).  
  
And then there was his connection to Lucas. Haley had been there when Lucas had learned who his father was. Years and years ago, when Lucas first became aware of the gossip, Karen had sat him down and explained that Lucas's father was Dan Scott. Lucas knew Dan as Nathan's dad, knew that he lived mere minutes from them. Karen, as gently as possible, explained that yes, Nathan's father was his father, and that Dan did not accept that he had more than one son. It was to Haley that Lucas had gone that night. He hadn't said anything but she had known that something was wrong. They had walked around for hours, Lucas silent, Haley growing more and more concerned, but sensing, somehow, that he needed time and that the best thing she could do was to just be there.  
  
Finally, he had turned towards his home and she had followed. It was late, much later than kids their age should have been out. Lucas had taken her hand as they walked into his house, squeezing it tightly. Karen had been sitting at the kitchen table, eyes red and looking older than Haley had ever seen her. Lucas had smiled, ever the strong one, kissed his mother's cheek and said goodnight to them both.   
  
Haley, completely confused, had not a clue as to what had gone on that evening. Karen had looked at her and upon registering her presence made an effort to look as though nothing was wrong. She had failed miserably, but Haley, somewhat more tactful than your average pre-teen, didn't tell her so. Karen had stood, and assured Haley that her mother had been called and that she wouldn't be in trouble. Mrs. James had agreed to let her stay the night, making an exception to the no sleepovers on weekdays rule.   
  
Karen had made up the couch for her and they had talked about school, the latest thing one of Haley's little brothers had pulled, normal things like that. It was only once Haley was settled and Karen was about to leave, that she asked, "Are you and Lucas going to be okay?" knowing that she had to know the answer or she would never be able to sleep. As hard as she had tried to ignore it, a little voice in her head had been conjuring up the worst scenarios all evening.  
  
Karen, at that moment realizing what Haley must be thinking, rushed to reassure her. She'd squeezed herself onto the edge of the couch and said, in that fiercely honest way mothers have, "We'll be fine Haley. I promise you that."  
  
Haley had smiled, comforted, "Just thought I'd check."  
  
Karen had smiled back, "Goodnight, Haley."  
  
"'Night." She'd turned onto her side and closed her eyes. She heard Karen leave the room, fuss around in the kitchen for a few minutes before going upstairs. She'd fallen asleep listening to the low murmurs of Karen and Lucas's voices upstairs.  
  
She'd been woken up by Lucas a few hours later, the sky outside still inky black. He had two glasses of milk and a plate of cookies Karen had thoughtfully provided. Haley had sat up, shaken off her sleepiness, making room for him on the couch and generously sharing her blankets. Lucas had handed her one of the glasses and balanced the plate between them.  
  
They'd talked for a long, long time that night.   
  
From then on Haley had made a point to pay more attention to Nathan than she would have had the situation been different. Back then he hadn't been all that different from all the other boys that she had known. He'd liked sports, all of them then, football, baseball, soccer, not just basketball. He gave the teachers a bit of a hard time. He didn't do spectacularly well in school. He was mildly obnoxious. But he wasn't purposefully mean or cruel. Just your average middle school kid.  
  
She knew exactly when he had found out about his connection to Lucas. She had no idea how, but she was guessing that Dan, deciding that Nathan would probably hear it from somewhere else eventually, had sat him down and told him some bullshit story about how a girl he had dated in high school had gotten pregnant and told the town it was his. Dan, of course, would have denied that it was even a possibility.   
  
They were in the seventh grade then. Haley had noticed Nathan studying Lucas, his expression going from speculative to contemptuous. And so it began.  
  
Looking back, it was right around then that that Nathan began twisting into the one she knew today. The process had been gradual. If one hadn't been paying attention they would have missed it. Basketball became the center of his world, his focus seeming out of place on one so young. His obnoxiousness became harmful as he used it against others. He walked differently, talked differently. Disdain for others not in his precious inner circle, and even for some of those lucky few, positively radiated from him. His wealth, something he'd barely been aware of before, was flaunted now. He used his natural charm to get what he wanted from anyone who was willing to give it. He seemed to age faster than the rest of them. Probably faster then he should have so that even though his birthday was in November, making him one of the youngest in their grade, he seemed to be the oldest.   
  
Haley had thought the 'new' Nathan repulsive. She'd taken to rolling her eyes whenever he'd passed her in the hall. She'd cracked jokes at his expense about his apparent inferiority complex. The new Nathan represented everything she hated about the screwed up value system and social hierarchy associated with high school. She hated that suddenly certain people were unworthy because the high school gods didn't deem them attractive or cool or rich enough. Things like intelligence and basic human decency ceased to matter.  
  
Haley stayed on the fringes and she liked it that way. Those that attempted to taunt her quickly gave up as she either laughed in their faces at the obvious lameness of their insults or fired back, confusing them with her superior wit. She refused to take it lying down, which took the fun out of trying to torment her.  
  
As far as she was concerned Nathan's one saving grace, the thing that kept her from hating him outright, and plotting his death, was that he avoided Lucas. Granted, it was rather ass-y considering they were brothers, but it was better than the alternative.  
  
Lucas hated, simply hated, the small-minded gossip about him and his mother and their situation. He did the best he could to let it roll off his back and he mostly succeeded. However sometimes it would get to him and he'd become quiet and withdrawn until someone (usually his mom or Haley) would snap him out of it. He was pretty well adjusted, all things considered.  
  
Nathan chose to ignore Lucas. His followers did the same. They co-existed in an uneasy state of mutual denial.  
  
Until, that is, that was no longer possible.  
  



	2. Liking

Notes: I'm so sorry about the wait. I'd forgotten I had uploaded OTH fic here at ff.net. This is the final part of Baby Steps. The endings kind of weird but I find I of like it that way.

Part Two:  
  
It was all Nathan's fault. And Haley absolutely itched to tell him that sometimes. She knew that it would piss him off. He had his screwed up notion that nothing was ever his fault. Oh, how she loved trying to kick down his delusions. If he hadn't stolen the school bus (and she knew it was him. The whole school did) Lucas would have continued playing at Riverside Courts. Even Nathan's taunts and pranks had an effect opposite to what he intended. Lucas was the most stubborn person she knew. If you challenged him, he wouldn't back down.   
  
Actually, she saw the same trait in Nathan. That worried her. It meant that he would keep upping his efforts to make Lucas quit and Lucas would just dig his heels in more, refusing to be defeated. She was fairly certain that something very, very bad was going to come of the situation.  
  
Which was why she was here, every morning at the docks, at a damnable hour. She knew, from the very second Nathan had walked into the tutoring center that her had an agenda. She wasn't stupid. Nathan and his sizable ego thought he could charm her onto his side against Lucas. But, in hope of possibly defusing a very volatile situation, she had played the dumb little lamb heading for the slaughter.   
  
Then Lucas had found out. That had been a thorny situation. He had frozen her out for a while until she had gotten fed up with the silent treatment and stood on his porch, yelling at him for being a child and then refusing to go home until he talked to her. She had sat there for two hours until she had heard him come downstairs. Then, being far too much of a softy to let his best friend freeze her ass to his porch, he had come out, bearing tea and an extra sweater no less. Luke truly was the greatest guy she knew.  
  
She had been completely honest with him. Had apologized profusely for not telling him and explained that she was only trying to protect him.  
  
"Haley, I really don't need you to protect me."  
  
"I know you don't. Just as I don't need *you* to protect *me*. But you try anyway, don't you?"  
  
Lucas, knowing better then to play the gender card, acquiesced grudgingly, made her promise to be careful, and promised to beat the snot out of Nathan should he hurt her, suspension or no.  
  
Haley, quite seriously, promised to help.   
  
And then things had been back to normal between them. Nathan and Haley began to meet regularly, same time, same place. He'd whined about it, as was his nature, saying that since Lucas knew, there was no need for the remote location. Haley, wisely, had insisted to continue meeting at the docks. Public Nathan was a person she wanted to avoid if at all possible. Besides, she'd countered, did he really want all his jock friends knowing he needed tutoring?   
  
The first few sessions had tried her patience. He did, as she anticipated, try to worm his way into her good graces, trying to impress her with his wealth and popularity and charm. She had shut him down every time. Additionally, at least the first five minutes of each of those sessions she spent reaming him out for whatever his latest effort to antagonize Lucas was. He was, in short, a colossal pain in the ass. And she honestly considered giving up on him. It would have been the first black mark on her otherwise excellent tutoring record, but he was just that much of an irritant.  
  
Then, the Tuesday of the second week he had been early. A first. "I have something for you Haley."  
  
Haley had been suspicious, thinking that whatever it was, it could not be anything good (although the crackerjack bracelet had been a little cute), had said, her usual sarcasm alive and kicking, "Animal, vegetable, or mineral?"  
  
Unfazed, Nathan had replied, "Vegetable. I think. Paper comes from trees and trees would fall under vegetable, right?"  
  
"Just give it to me."  
  
"You're no fun," but he slid the paper he had been holding to her and sat down across from her.  
  
She glanced at it. It appeared to be a math quiz on the concepts they had spent much of the last week drilling. And on top, was a big fat red B. Haley, despite herself, felt the usual jubilation she felt when someone she helped succeed well up, "Well smack my ass and call me Betty! You're not hopeless after all!"  
  
Nathan, still not accustomed to the weirdness she occasionally spewed was mystified, "Uh… yay?"   
  
She reached over and patted him on the head as one would a child, "It's awesome. Be happy!"  
  
"Oh, I am. It's the best I've done on a math test since… well… ever. I guess. My mom wants to put it on the fridge."  
  
"Mine still does that too. Parents are so cute sometimes."   
  
And so followed the first session that Haley left not having the urge to bang her head against a hard surface afterwards.  
  
Then, as the sessions progressed, that feeling became the rule rather than the exception. She began to enjoy the sessions, just a tiny bit. She looked at her snooze button less longingly every morning. Nathan mellowed slightly, at least outside of school. The incidents of Lucas torment lessened.   
  
It was well into the fourth week of their arrangement that Haley realized something. Nathan Scott was not, contrary to her previously held conclusion, entirely evil.   
  
It was a shocking.  
  
Furthermore, in addition to not being evil, he could, occasionally, be something approaching likable. The revelation somehow managed to break through Haley's anti-Nathan shields. He could be funny. He was considerate enough to find out how she liked her coffee and brought her a cup everyday. He wasn't even stupid. Just undisciplined and kind of spastic.   
  
It was an entirely normal day. A Thursday, slightly overcast. Nathan had basketball practice later, Haley, a shift at Karen's. They were discussing his latest English assignment, a paper on the themes present in Lord of the Flies. They disagreed, as they often did, about one of the main issues, the nature of good and evil.  
  
Haley had one of those moments. The one of those where her brain stepped back to analyze the situation dispassionately. There she was. Sitting at a table with Nathan Scott who should, quite rightly, be on her list of top ten most detestable people. But there she was, listening to him talk, honestly interested in what he had to say, drinking the coffee he had bought for her, leaning towards him slightly... It struck her as wrong. A betrayal of Lucas. And so she hurriedly began to pack up her stuff.   
  
Nathan allowed his sentence to trail off as he watched her, "What are you doing?"  
  
"I have to… I just remembered… Damn!" And just like that she left.   
  
Nathan watched her go, feeling like he had missed something very important.  
  
Haley did not head to school but in the opposite direction. It was instinctive. She needed advice so her body found Karen. She barreled through the door, the bells announcing her presence loudly. No one was there yet as the place had just opened.  
  
Karen walked out of the back, wiping her hands, preparing to greet a customer, "Haley!" she glanced at the clock, "shouldn't you be going to school?"  
  
"I should. But I'm not. I need a brownie." Wordlessly, Karen got her one. "Karen? Can I ask you something that I really have no business asking?"  
  
"If you feel you really need to know something, I'll try to answer you."  
  
"What did you see in Dan?"  
  
"Haley… why…" Whatever Karen had been expecting, that was not it.  
  
"See, you know I've been tutoring Nathan, right?" Karen nodded. "Well, today, he was talking and thought I saw something. For a second there it was like… he ceased to be Nathan Scott, basketball player, and was just this guy named Nathan, you know? Just a kid I go to high school with who isn't good at math. And I think I could kind of like that kid."  
  
"I don't think I should tell you what Dan was like."  
  
"What? Why?"  
  
"Because I think it would influence what you think about Nathan, and that's not fair. Not to him. Not to you. Don't hold who his father is or was against him."  
  
"Why? Don't you hate Nathan?"  
  
"Of course not. Haley, he's just a kid."  
  
"Must you be so fair all the time?"  
  
"I'm a mom. It's my job."  
  
Haley smiled, "Thanks anyway. I'll see you this afternoon?"  
  
"Three sharp."  
  
Haley got to school fairly quickly. She was a little bit of an overachiever and the thought of missing class bothered her more than she would ever admit out loud. She slid into the desk of her second period class only two minutes after the bell. She got a glare from the teacher, but nothing more. The rest of the day flew by as she got into her school groove. Taking notes, answering questions, and all the stuff she was good at.  
  
She and Luke were walking across the front lawn when she heard someone call her name. She turned and it was Nathan, speed walking towards them. It was a bit of an unusual occurrence. They'd nodded to each other in the hallways lately, but had never acknowledged their tutoring relationship.  
  
Luke tensed as Nathan neared. "Hey," Nathan said, not really excluding Lucas from the greeting.  
  
"Hi," Haley said. Lucas was silent. She turned to him, looked the secret look to show she was okay and said, "I'll meet you at the café?"  
  
"Sure. Bye." And he walked away, shooting warning glances at Nathan.  
  
Haley turned her full attention to him, "Wow. No carnage. I do believe you're evolving." But her tone wasn't in the least bit biting.  
  
"Yeah. Don't tell anyone," he paused and groped for words, "Listen, I just wanted to make sure we were cool. This morning you seemed a little…"  
  
"Schizophrenic? Yeah, don't worry. I'm back on the meds."  
  
Nathan laughed and Haley liked the sound. "So I'll see you tomorrow? Same time same place?"  
  
"Sure. Where else would I be? Getting my beauty sleep like a normal person?"  
  
He smirked, not the one that made her want to slap him, but a different one, "It's not like you need it."  
  
She rolled her eyes, "That was so lame."  
  
"When a gentleman compliments you you're supposed to say thank you."  
  
"When a gentleman compliments me I'll remember that," she paused, expecting a smart-ass comeback that never came. Again, the eyes rolled, "Whatever, I'll see you." She began to walk away.  
  
"Have fun at work."  
  
She kept walking.   
  
END.  



End file.
